


do not stand at my grave and weep (i am not there. i do not sleep.)

by hallelujah99



Series: The Goodkind-Shalifoe Family [14]
Category: The Wilds (TV 2020)
Genre: Angst, Death, Death from Old Age, F/F, Far Future, Mentions of Cancer, Religion, Sad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-13
Updated: 2021-03-13
Packaged: 2021-03-21 07:15:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,366
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30018105
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hallelujah99/pseuds/hallelujah99
Summary: "In her near-century of life, Shelby never figured out a good way to die. "Shelby copes with the death of her wife after seventy years together.
Relationships: Shelby Goodkind/Toni Shalifoe
Series: The Goodkind-Shalifoe Family [14]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2088612
Comments: 7
Kudos: 68





	do not stand at my grave and weep (i am not there. i do not sleep.)

In her near-century of life, Shelby never figured out a good way to die. 

If she’d been able to figure it out, she’d have given it Toni, no question. And although Toni’s death was about as good as anyone could ask for-relatively painless, surrounded by loved ones, it was still gut-wrenchingly awful. Shelby had sat with Melody that night. She’d wanted to be with her daughters, but couldn’t bear to let them see her like that, and trusted their spouses to be there for them. Melody had lost her husband 2 years prior and said she understood, and although Shelby knew she’d loved her husband very much, she secretly didn’t think she could really understand. 

Shelby thought back to 70 years prior, lying next to Toni under the lychee tree for the very first time. After Toni drifted off, Shelby stayed awake, eyes wide open, as she remembered all the lectures about virginity. She’d felt that she had given the biggest and most important piece of herself away, something she could never get back. It almost made her laugh in her grief, to think of her naïveté at 17. She’d given Toni her virginity, but if that even counted as a part of her, it was a tiny wisp of her. Over her life time, she gave her entire soul over to her. And now that Toni was gone, she felt her own soul was gone, too.

She thought she understood what she was promising at their wedding. A life by her side, through good times and bad, in sickness and in health, as long as they both shall live. And it was all that but so much more. 

It was an intertwining of lives and spirits until they were intrinsically one. 

It was existential worries about the humans they’d brought into the world, worries that didn’t end when they turned 18, worries that didn’t end even now that her children had grandchildren of their own. 

It was so many wonderful nights together that, as amazing as they were individually, still all added up to so much more than the sum of their parts. 

It was fighting too, sometimes, but she could count on one hand the number of times they’d really lost their cool with each other. One time, Shelby had been right, another, Toni had, and the third time, well it didn’t really matter anyway. Most of the fighting was done as their therapists had taught them, with eye contact, openness about feelings, and with their love and respect for one another at the center of it all. 

Their routines changed over time, from the routine of wild and passionate nights all over each other, to routines of bottles and diapers, to permission slips and Disneyworld trips, to a routine of calm nights by each other’s side and visits from the next generations. The phases of their lives together all blended into one another, but it was all cut off now, definitely, forever. 

In the first couple months after she let go of Toni for the last time, she felt herself staying alive only because she couldn’t bear to let her kids lose both parents in such a short time span. It was three months after, enjoying a delicious home-cooked meal by June’s wife, she realized that there were still simple pleasures for her left to enjoy, despite the ache for Toni to be there, enjoying them with her.

In time, she came to see that Toni was still there, in little ways. She was there in Isla’s brown eyes that always shone just like her mother’s, and in the way June so fiercely protected the ones she loved. She was there in the way their youngest grandson dominated the basketball court, and when Shelby closed her eyes at night, she could feel her, still living in her heart. She figured in the same way she’d given Toni her soul, she’d received so much of Toni’s soul in return.

When Shelby went to visit Fatin, a worker in the care home did her makeup for the first time in as long as Shelby could remember, and it felt so good to be pampered, for once. 

Fatin turned to look at her, and though she was all but totally blind, she whistled “Looking good, Shelby! I bet Toni’s looking down, wishing she could get her hands on you.” And even though Shelby felt a pang in her heart, she had to laugh, if only because it was impressive how the decades upon decades never changed Fatin too much. 

Fatin must have sensed how much Shelby needed a laugh and continued “Rachel’s probably rolling her eyes that even NOW, she can’t escape you two being all gross for each other.”

“Dottie is still managing the chaos I’m sure.” Shelby said with a smile, and in her mind she saw all the girls together, in whatever true paradise was. 

“I know you miss her, and all of them, but you can’t leave me just yet, okay?” Fatin said when she saw Shelby’s eyes go far away. 

“I’ll do my best.” Shelby assured her, and visits with Fatin became something else to live for. They lived mostly in the past, talking about the island, the numerous funerals over the previous twelve years, and every wonderful, difficult, impossible and glorious year in between. They lived in the present too, occasionally, and Shelby nearly broke a rib laughing when she watch Fatin openly flirt with a man in his thirties, who’d come to visit his grandfather. “There’s still so many things I want to do in the world.” Fatin told her one time, and Shelby’s heart ached for her friend because she herself was ready to go, but Fatin wanted to fight it. “So many people, may be more accurate.” Fatin added on, lightening the mood. 

Shelby’s pastor, McKayla, visited her monthly. It was always a source of comfort, of course, praying with her and listening to the Bible verses and prayers she’d pick out. When Shelby was little, she always thought that pastors knew what heaven looked like, but she never asked McKayla, of course, she had long since figured out everyone was just guessing. 

It was something her and Toni talked about, more times than she could even estimate. At 17, Toni had denied any possibility of an afterlife, at 87, Toni whispered in her ear that she’d see her again, with conviction and certainty that had grown over many years, fueled by the feeling that it simply wasn’t feasible that they wouldn’t be together again one day. Shelby had watched that belief develop over the years between. Toni never believed in God, but she did believe in something greater, something after. It occurred to her that soon, they’d be able to settle perhaps their very first argument ever-about the existence of God. Shelby figured if she was right, she might find a branch in heaven she could lightly smack Toni with. 

When Shelby went for her annual appointment to see if her breast cancer had returned, she wasn’t particularly surprised to learn it had. It still so often felt like her soul had been cleared out, it only made sense her body would give way to something malignant instead. 

It felt awful, wasting away the way she did, knowing she was leaving behind Fatin, her great-grand babies, her grandkids, and most of all, her daughters.

Fatin seemed to know, the way she held Shelby’s hand tightly the last time she saw her. Shelby could hear and understand her but wasn’t able to respond very much. “When you see them, tell them I’m coming soon enough. I always knew I’d be missing all you bitches one day.” Shelby hoped Fatin could see her smile. 

In her near-century of life, Shelby never figured out a good way to die. She slipped away, each of her daughters holding a hand in both of theirs-there with their mother for her last breath, as she’d been with them for their very first. The last thing Shelby ever felt was the love from her daughters, from the perfect humans she had created with Toni.

_“Hi love. Did you miss me?”_

_“Every single day.”_

**Author's Note:**

> WOW why did I write this? I don't like sad things! I like happy things!!!
> 
> A PURE fluff fic (from this universe) is in the works, as well as a second chapter for my Band AU (even though I swore it'd be a one-shot...)
> 
> Anyway, if you're a masochist and read this and enjoyed it, please drop a comment!! Thank you!!!


End file.
